Preaching

According to even the most conservative statistics, pornography is wrecking the bodies,
minds, and souls of millions of Christians in America. Nevertheless, most pastors are unsure
how to address this pandemic problem in their sermons.

This project suggests a solution. If a preacher verbalizes this taboo topic, normalizes the
struggle for God’s people, demonizes the sin of lust, evangelizes those struggling with sexual
sin, and strategizes ways for every member of the church to honor God with their bodies, the
pulpit might become a powerful solution for the saints’ struggle.

In this project, twelve pastors were surveyed and studied in order to create a workshop in
hopes of equipping them to preach wisely, boldly, and effectively on the topic of pornography.

A PRIMER FOR TRAINING EFFECTIVE PREACHERS IN THE LOCAL CHURCH
Training in effective preaching is helpful for the experienced preacher and the novice. This project gathered insights from experts on preaching, and organized them in six training sessions walking one through the entire process of preaching. These sessions were presented to a pilot group of pastors and teachers to further equip them for preaching, and to solicit their feedback on how the material could be improved to train others. Feedback was sought in group interviews and follow-up e-mail surveys. The sessions were revised and returned to the pilot group to be used to equip others in preaching.

Every Sunday pastors across the spectrum attempt to preach in memorable ways. So if traditional wisdom is actually true – most churchgoers forget the sermon immediately upon leaving church – then does that qualify as memorable? While realizing no sermon lingers forever, this project explores ways to give the sermon a longer shelf life in the parishioner’s memory. Specifically, by utilizing picture, story, and object lesson in various sermons, this experiment conducted at Sandy Plains Baptist Church in Shelby, North Carolina, examines which memory cues (if any) are most effective in keeping the sermon fixed in the long-term memory of its hearers.

The purpose of preaching in the local church is to cause the hearer to grow into the image of Christ. In Eph. 4:11-32; Paul shows the responsibility of the pastor/teacher or shepherd to "perfect the saints." God has given the Holy Spirit, the Word of God, and the church as means for every believer to grow. The pastor of First Baptist church of Pecatonica, Illinois, developed six messages from the Ephesians 4 passage and preached them in the Sunday morning worship services of the church. The people were given pre-sermon and post-sermon surveys as well as a five-day devotional each week. The purpose was to determine if spiritual grow took place over this time through the messages preached. It was concluded that spiritual growth does come from preaching but that it is hard to see in a short period of time.

"So what?" This is the question every believer should ask at the end of any sermon because the Word of God should be applied to the Christian's life. If the sermon's goal is to effect change in the lives of the congregation, then the preacher has the obligation to not only explain the text but explain what the text means in a practical outworking of daily living. The balance that must be struck is the role of the preacher combined with the role of the Holy Spirit to guide the listener in how to apply the sermon.
This project shows the importance of application in preaching God's Word and seeks to determine the extent to which a pastor should provide this application in preaching. With many different examples from Scripture combined with varying views of application from extra-biblical sources available to the preacher, navigating the nuances of homiletics can be overwhelming and confusing. This project endeavors to provide some clarity to the matter as it pertains to application.
This project involves the preaching of nine sermons after which volunteers complete two surveys for each sermon which ask the volunteers what they believed to be the application in the sermon as well as how they plan to apply that application; the second survey asks if and how the sermon was applied. The surveys, including the interaction with the volunteers, are handled anonymously through the aid of an administrator.
This project shows the importance of the partnership between the human preacher's provision of application in the sermon with the Holy Spirit working in the believer to apply the Word. Additionally, the support for varying methods of application across the preacher's body of work is explained.

The multi-religious context in which India preaching has to adorn herself with the garb of sensitivity is the backdrop of this thesis. Against this backdrop the author proposes that a preacher can be trained to appeal to the cognitive, emotive, spiritual, and psychological aspects of the listeners for a transformed life interpreting Christian Scripture and Tradition in the multi-religious pastoral context of India in general and of the Diocese of Palayamkottai in particular. The thesis is divided into five chapters.

Chapter One, after spelling out the background, the need, the process, and the scope of the study, sets the context of the Diocese of Palayamkottai with a special reference to religious pluralism in India in general and in Palayamkottai in particular.

In Chapter Two, after briefly analyzing the homiletical understanding before Pope Francis in the light of General Introduction of the Roman Missal and Verbum Domini, we meet the two dialogue partners of our study from the viewpoint of effective proclamation of the Gospel and embracing different traditions with respect, viz., Pope Francis’ Evangelii Gaudium, and Bede Griffiths’ Sannyasa.

Chapter Three divides into three sections: In section one, the challenges that a preacher, a preaching, and a listener face in a multi-religious context are presented; section two proposes models (participatory, narrative sermon reflected in the life of the preacher) for a better preaching in multi-religious background, while section three will try to resolve the challenges in the light of the proposed model.

In Chapter Four a sampling study is done by picking up seven preachers.

Chapter Five is a practical guide that will serve as a manual for a preacher offering different models of preaching.

This project addressed the need for preaching principles that more effectively communicate to those living in the realities of our current cultural. In examining the sermons of the apostle Paul, it was evident that he significantly contextualized his message to his various audiences, demonstrating for all preachers the need to engage in not only good exegesis of the text but in good exegesis of the audience. The researcher attempted to gain a better understanding of the culture of the community surrounding his church in Andover, Minnesota and ways to communicate clearly to this culture. The primary tool used was a survey conducted at a community festival on church property. The survey was designed to measure the level of biblical knowledge of the participants and also to investigate the relationship between church attendance and the demonstrated levels of biblical knowledge. The assumption of the researcher was that preachers often assume their congregations know more than they do, and this assumption was proven to hold merit. Finally, in assessing the above information, a set of homiletical principles were developed that embrace both a commitment to biblical preaching and an awareness of the realities of post-church American culture. One of the conclusions of the author is that a neglected aspect of homiletics is our need to wrestle through the striking differences between oral and written communication styles. The preacher’s preparation must keep these dynamics in mind if he/she hopes to communicate the timeless truths of the Bible to a time-bound audience.

The purpose of this project was to enhance the project director's doctrinal preaching skills at Gate City Baptist Church, Pocatello, Idaho, to increase congregational awareness of selected Baptist distinctives. The project director researched the fields of doctrinal preaching and Baptist distinctives. The project director researched the fields of doctrinal preaching and Baptist distinctives. He also developed two annotated bibliographies. Experts in their respective fields evaluated these bibliographies for proficiency and scholarship. The director developed a sermon series to increase congregational awareness of Baptist distinctives. Finally, he preached these selected Baptist distinctives to worshipers at Gate City Baptist Church. He used several tools to determine the success of the project, including a pre-test and post-test and rubrics related to doctrinal preaching and Baptist doctrine.

The purpose of this project was to enhance the project director's collaborative preaching skills in order to improve sermon planning at Christview Christian Church in Southaven, Mississippi. The project director used the Preaching Skills Enhancement Model to design the project. He began by researching the current trends in collaborative preaching and sermon preparation. Based on this research, he developed a process for sermon preparation that included collaborative skills. The director studied the effectiveness of this process by developing six sermons with a sermon-planning team of selected elders and lay leaders from Christview Christian Church. The six sermons and their preparation were evaluated by the sermon-planning team in order to determine the effectiveness of collaborative preaching skills on sermon planning.

A prior study of a congregation in Winter Haven, Florida revealed an overlap in perceived, ideal qualities of clergy and lay leaders of the church. However, these qualities were limited to exclusively shepherding and teaching roles. Through preaching a 5-week sermon series, this project began to shape a vision of shared ministry and leadership in this local church among clergy and laity alike. The series used the APEST model of Ephesians 4, taken from the missional hermeneutic of Alan Hirsch. The project assessed the emergence of an inchoate understanding of the missional imperative through ethnographic data, gathered in a sermon roundtable, and surveys collected congregationally.